TL; DR – Shirring isn’t as hard as I thought it was going to be. Use stay tape.

Orange was, like, *the* color this summer, and in true ADHD fashion, when I realized I didn’t have any orange, I went nuts and bought a ton of orange fabric (see, for example, ORANGE MOD DRESS), including some very soft, very pretty orange-accented floral print jerseys.

And then was like, ugh, why do I have so much floral print, yuck. And I am too lazy to change the needle on my sewing machine to a stretch needle. And, I don’t even know what I would make from these. And, again, UGH Y SO MUCH FLORAL.

Stupid ADHD brain.

Then Love Sewing came out with a one of their free patterns (that would actually fit me, but that’s another story), in collaboration with My Handmade Wardrobe, the Jersey Days Dress (you need to create a free account with them to see the pattern and the instructions are only available in their magazine). I thought it would be PERFECT. I love the wrap detail on the neckline (sigh), and it looked SUPER EASY.

Except my ADHD brain didn’t notice that, hey, IT IS SHIRRED. I had not yet shirred anything yet. There were a TON of patterns this summer that required shirring, and I had even bought the required elastic thread to put in my bobbin in order to do shirring. But I hadn’t because I thought it would be too hard. And then I am putting this pattern together and realize part-way through, oh shit, I have to do this new technique.

Readers, I actually followed the advice of any tutorial out there that you can find to test it on a scrap piece of the same fabric first. It would beautifully the first time, so I drew my lines, and sewed some shirring.

LOOK AT THAT SHIRRING!

I didn’t follow the pattern directions exactly, and I (sigh) didn’t stay-stitch the neckline (and also forgot that I could just use stay tape instead), but the neckline didn’t go nearly as badly as my last wrap-front dress. I’m wearing it right now as I write this, and I have to keep pulling the shoulders back to make sure it stays where it is supposed to be, but my hair covers it for Zoom calls, and this is a problem I have with anything that even hints at cleavage.

I am really glad that I took the plunge and shirred. This dress is perfect for fall and because the jersey is SO FREAKING SOFT it’s secret pajamas, too!